Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 53965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 270(@200wpm)___ 216(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 53965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 270(@200wpm)___ 216(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
“I think I woke up to you coming upstairs,” mama chuckles. “And I believe it was close to midnight!”
“It was twelve thirty,” Paul mutters as he steps out of the backdoor with his laptop and stack of files in his hands. He eyes me, but he doesn’t say anything else before he slumps into a chair in front of a sandwich my mother has made for him. My father glances at him over the top of his book and scowls a little before looking back to the pages.
Papa and Paul are “at it again,” as my mother informed me when I finally stumbled downstairs this morning. Apparently, there was a blowout fight late last night after I left for “bible study,” and apparently, it was a bad one.
It’s not the first time my parents—particularly my father—and Paul have argued about, well, several things. Him leaving home for a little bit before he even finished high school was a big one, but they forgave him and took him back in. Then there was the DUI he got after finally graduating, and again, they put it aside. When Paul “left” the school my parents had scraped together money to send him to, it was pretty clear even to me that it was less of a voluntary “leaving” and more of a “being asked to leave situation.”
But they still took him back. Forgiveness runs strong in our family, I guess.
But his upcoming marriage to Lizzie Purcell has been a pretty hot topic for months now. For one, because he been completely wishy-washy on when they might actually be getting married, and for two, because Lizzie has never once even spoken to my parents since they got engaged. Which is… weird, to say the least.
She and Paul have never come over for dinner, she’s never even called my mother—her future mother-in-law—to even say hi. On top of that, it’s not even like they’re a couple who like their privacy or anything, or like they’re one of those “they’re so opposite it’s cute” situations. It’s like they’re not a couple at all. Plus, Lizzie is just… I wrinkle my nose. She’s not exactly a nice, warm person. None of the Purcells are, actually. They’re one of the oldest families in Canaan, but Thomas Purcell, her father who owns and presides over the Purcell Savings and Loans Bank in downtown, mostly walks around town as if he’s a king and we’re all his lowly subjects.
Bottom line, Lizzie is a cold, snobby, rich girl, which makes it extra strange that she’s marrying a middle-class college drop out who’s trying to build a church and be a small-town minister.
The last time this all came to a head, I actually had to find out the details through the gossip chain a week later. Paul and my father got into blow-out fight in the living room, and Paul left roaring that it was “none of my father’s damn business.” He was gone for a week that time, but eventually came home to his pseudo-apartment above the garage. Eventually, I got it through Melanie Krupa that a friend of my father had sworn with his hand on a bible that he’d seen Paul’s new fiancée out on the town in Athens when he was there on business, making out with some other guy outside a fancy hotel before going inside with him.
That’s what that last fight was about—my father asking Paul if he was really sure about his plans for marriage, and Paul yelling back that it wasn’t his business. Last night was again about his marriage to Lizzie and how my parents just want to sit down with them both and talk about it. Mama says it got pretty heated, too.
“Pass the lemonade, Delilah,” Paul grumbles.
I reach for it, but my father growls lowly.
“Please.”
Paul frowns and looks at him. “What?”
“Please,” my father grunts. “We raised you in a good, Christian home, Paul, and we use manners in this house.”
“I’m twenty-seven years old, dad,” Paul grunts. “I don’t need to be lectured.”
“Twenty-seven years old, living in the apartment above your parents’ garage—”
“Jeb,” mama says quietly, putting a hand on his arm. He grinds his teeth and lowers his book, looking at Paul.
“And marrying a girl we don’t get to meet, who doesn’t seem to want to even acknowledge you have a family. That sum it up, Mr. Grown-up?”
“You’ll meet her, okay? I’ve been busy, dad,” Paul hisses.
“And we’re proud of you, son,” Papa grunts. “We are, truly. I’m so proud that a son of mine is building a church! Right here in Canaan!”
My mother frowns. “We are, honey, but Paul, it’s also like you’re leading this double—”
“Leave it!” Paul roars.
My father bellows and lunges to his feet. “You will mind your goddamn tone when you speak to your mother!”
I shiver, because my father using the Lord’s name like that is no small thing. Paul just starts to laugh, though.